by Hillary Pasternak (@gemofpurestray)
What’s the state of the union on concept albums? It’s a pop music trope that seems to wander in and out of the zeitgeist like a neighborhood cat. Just when you think she may have been adopted or hit by a car, there she is hiding under your neighbor’s Subaru. We saw our first concept albums in the late 60s and 70s, your Tommy’s and your Sgt. Pepper’s and such. The prog rock grandfathers of the 70s and 80s kept them alive for a long time, then Green Day made sure they’d have space in the 21st century’s top 40 with their Bush-bashing pop punk opera American Idiot in 2004. More recently, current big names have taken the idea out for a spin: the Weeknd’s mustachioed psychopomp synthwave odyssey Dawn FM and her highness Beyoncé’s sprawling, emotional/topical visual album Lemonade.
These top 40 concept albums all reach for a certain drama or brashness. What about a gentler take? Turn to “the cutest band in indie.” Divine Sweater is bassist Alex Goldberg, keyboardist Steve Lin, drummer Chris Southiere, guitarist/multi instrumentalist Sean Seaver, and calmly authoritative vocalist Meghan Kelleher. They’re a terminally amiable Boston act taking the concept album to a more chilled out place. This is the end of the world on soft rock. We’re not necessarily dealing in the spooky, twisting emotional drama of Fleetwood Mac or the charming/sleazy pop-soul cheese of Hall and Oates. More Modelo-on-the-boardwalk than spritzes-on-the-yacht.
Down Deep (A Nautical Apocalypse) ambles through a cozily dystopian world. The concept is more of an environment than a narrative. Sure, the world’s been flooded and we’re all living in a network of interconnected submarines, and there’s an old woman in the corner playing a waterlogged guitar, but there’s still plenty of time for Down Deep’s narrators to reflect on the lost world and the people they can’t seem to find again. It’s not without darkness. The title track may be the chilliest song about drowning in the history of popular music, and makes an extremely funny follow up to “Trapped Under Ice” by Metallica on one of my playlists.
When they’re ready to gesture towards drama, Sweater enjoys a building soft rock crescendo, like Chicago before them (if they’re looking for live covers, I’d love to hear their take on “25 or 6 to 4.”). “2x2” off their last album is an update on the gently urgent flamenco-rock of Dire Straits “Sultans of Swing” with some funkier bass and a gutsy, melodic chorus. Dire Straits isn’t a bad comparison in general. Sweater’s got the same observant, detailed lyrical bent and complex, noodling guitar textures.
There are a few moments that rise above the agreeable fray. Kelleher’s voice is casual and confessional for the most part, but she pulls out a moment of angelic, antigravity falsetto on the line “Eyes underneath the water/Looking up I thought that I saw heaven” halfway through “All the Way Back.” The modern flashes on Down Deep are few and fun. The intro to “All the Way Back” has a little Washed Out in its woozy synths, for instance.
Down Deep is relentlessly melodic, but light on hooks. Sweater’s most popular track on Spotify is the twinkling, melancholy “I Knew You Better” off 2021’s Divine Sweater Presents: The Ten Year Plan. It’s a gem crying out for the closing scenes of a network drama. Exactly the right amount of twee, like what Ingrid Michaelson was aiming for and occasionally achieving in the early 2010s, with a sneakily addictive ah ah aaahh aaahh hook taking you home. Nothing on Down Deep quite scales to that level, but this is a great option for the aux cord at your next family cookout – it also got a stamp of approval from my father, grill owner and long-term Doobie Brothers fan.